Cutting Coves on table saw

[Rick Lucrezi]

I am interested in cutting large coves for trim work. I have Tauntons "Trim Complete" book and they show clamping a piece of wood across the saw table at different angles to act as the fence, and then you run the piece to be cut at an angle to the blade. I gotta say, my gut says that's a bit sketchy. I have already had a few "accidents" and lost some digits, so I tend to be a bit cautious about this stuff. Anyone here do this technique?

[David DeCristoforo]

Many have done it ( I am one) and you are correct in your evaluation that it is a "bit sketchy". But it can be done safely. There are several tutorials on the 'net besides the Taunton one and I'm sure several will be posted here in response to your question.

[Lee Schierer]

I have done it also. It is less sketchy if you remove the majority of the material with a standard rip cut first. This will be much faster than raising the blade a little at a time and trying to hog out the entire radius. Make sure you clamp guide boards on both sides of the piece being cut and it is also a good idea to have feather boards pushing down. Us sa push stick to push the end across the blade. You can't use a guard or splitter for this operation. Remember easy does it. If you try to hog out the whole profile in a single pass, you will get lots of noise and plenty of smoke.

[Larry Edgerton]

I have had a few accidents as well, and have and still do cut coves with this method. I still don't like it and have bought shaper cutters to cut most sizes, but there are times when I need something specific....

I have made them with scrapers as well, you can always do that as well, kind of back to the roots.....

I use a dado blade when I make them, works better for me.

[Richard Wolf]

I have done it also and it does work well. One area of concern is you will try to hold the board down on the blade. As the center of the cove gets thinner, it is possible to push down hard enough to break the board. Hopefully, your hand is not over the blade when this happens.

Richard

[Ryan Griffey]

Here you go:

http://woodgears.ca/cove/index.html

[Joe Scharle]

Over the years I've cut 60-80 coves on the T/S with the 2 stick method. I can remember only 2 times when the work piece snapped over the blade. Those events are memorable. Last year I picked up Rocklers cove jig (on-sale) because I had a large piece of cove trim to do. What a world of difference! With the included hardware, setup is just a few minutes but best of all is the over blade featherboard, and NOT a push block.....in hand. Plan on slow going; 16 feet of 2X will run over an hour. Lots of cove angle calculators on the Web too.

[Brian Peters]

Works fine but the problem is the sanding required to get it clean afterwards. I would say you have to weigh your options - if you're running a few feet its the way to go, if you're running 100 feet you're better off finding a source or someone that can run it for you. And anything on a table saw can be dangerous relatively speaking it is a matter of how much precaution you take and how safe your setup is. Take your time, nice slow even passes, not too much pressure directly over the blade as said above and use push blocks if you can, never pass your hands over the blade or within a few inches of it, mark the guides exactly where that blade area is.

[Jamie Buxton]

I've done it too. I've done it only when I need some specific cove size or odd species, and can't find it from molding dealers. It is convenient, but it is a little scary, and you have to do a lot of hand sanding to take out the sawblade marks. Every time I do it, I think seriously about acquiring a real planer/molder. Y'know, a Williams & Hussey or the like. It'd do a much better job.

[Robert Parrish]

Rockler has a nice jig for this.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

I've done it too, and it is a little unearving at first. I use two fences, one on each side of the work, just in case the work where to split, it seems like it may be safer beacuse of support on both sides. Maybe not. That being said, there are better ways. Shapers, molders, and molding planes. Plan on lots of cleanup sanding or scraping.

[Steve Mellott]

I've made raised panel doors this way and it works fairly well. Multiple light passes and my hands (push blocks) are never over the blade.

Steve

[Bruce Wrenn]

Ditto on Joe's use of Rockler's Cove jig. If you have one, you might want to use a molding head with a round nose cutter set. Lots less sanding.

[Barry Richardson]

I have used it many times when I needed a big cove. I Don't thing there's anything particularly dangerous about it, but as Brian said, it takes a lot of sanding to smooth it up. A goose neck scraper helps alot. I just used the mentod a couple days ago on some hard maple to make jewelry box sides.

[Rick Lucrezi]

I tried it with the double fence method, and used an old plane modified to a push stick. I kept thinking about the board snapping in the middle. I decided that I wont be doing that any more. I need to follow my gut. Just a bit too unerving for me. Thanks for the tips, and votes of confidence.

[Craig Moulton]

Someone should start a NetJigs company. $25 a month and you can use any one specialized jig that you only need for one job and don't want to spend $400 on....

[Cody Colston]

I do it all the time and don't find anything particularly dangerous about it. Like any operation involving the TS, you have to focus on the task at hand.

I use one auxiliary fence and commercial push blocks to keep the stock flat on the table and against the fence as it's pushed through. I raise the blade 1/4 turn of the elevation handle for each pass. A flat-top blade will leave a lot cleaner cut than an ATB blade.

As mentioned, a gooseneck scraper will make pretty fast cleanup of the blade marks and you can finish it off with a spindle and sanding sleeve from an OSS if you have one...just select the appropriate size spindle.